Hit-and-run suspect in Taiwanese death held: Indian police

DEADLY COLLISION:A Taiwanese student who had been working with a group in India died instantly when the van he was traveling in was hit

Staff writer, with CNA, New Delhi

Police in India confirmed on Monday that one of the two hit-and-run suspects who killed a Taiwanese student volunteer and injured five others in a car crash turned himself in on Friday.

Jagat Singh Hooda, the district police chief in the northern Indian city of Palwal, said late on Monday that the suspect, identified as Karambir Jat, was driving the car for the owner, who lives in Faridabad City, which is about 20km from the scene of the crash.

The police chief said there were at least two men traveling in the car, including Jat and the car’s owner, when the accident took place. The car was traveling at about 100kph when it rear-ended a minivan which was carrying one Indian national as well as six student volunteers from Taiwan and China, while trying to overtake the vehicle. Hooda refused to comment on whether Jat was driving under the influence of alcohol or whether the car’s owner was the second suspect in the case.

In the Aug. 8 accident, which took place about 60km from Delhi on India’s No. 2 national highway, Liu Yao-wei (劉曜瑋), a 24-year-old student from Chinese Culture University, was killed instantly. Tsai Hsiang-ping (蔡湘萍), a student of Taipei-based Soochow University, sustained chest injuries and fractures to her leg in the accident. Three Chinese students also sustained injuries in the collision.

Tsai is to be transferred from the intensive care unit to the general ward in two days, the doctor treating her said on Monday. It will be another 10 to 14 days before Tsai can be discharged from the hospital and return to Taiwan for further treatment, the doctor said.

The student volunteers were recruited by AIESEC, a global youth organization, and they did volunteer work in Pune, the eighth-largest metropolis in India and the second-largest city in the western state of Maharashtra. After concluding their volunteer program, they went on a tour of the Golden Triangle, one of India’s most popular tourist circuits, which comprises the areas of Delhi, Agra and Jaipur.

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